The dissemination of information to a large number of telephone subscribers such that each of the subscribers receives the same or approximately the same message has become widespread for various purposes, e.g., solicitation, advertising and data presentation. Typically, the calling and presentation of the message are performed manually by a salaried individual, thereby being relatively expensive. Also, manual dialing of a telephone is susceptible to mistakes and may result in calling of the wrong subscriber or the same subscriber being called twice in succession, with possible resulting deleterious effects on the business of the calling party.
While some devices have been designed to enable different telephone numbers to be automatically called in sequence wherein a predetermined message is presented to an answering called party, these devices have generally been utilized in conjunction with emergency warning devices. In particular, the devices have been utilized for automatically calling the numbers of police or fire departments or other parties that are responsive to an emergency situation. The prerecorded message presents information regarding the location where an emergency situation has been automatically detected by transducers such as burglary alarms, fire arms, or machinery monitoring devices.
The prior art automatic emergency calling devices, however, are not adapted to cope with certain circumstances that may result when a large number of telephone subscribers are called in sequence and presented with a prerecorded message. There is a very low probability in automatic emergency calling devices of premature hang up, i.e., the called subscriber hanging up on the prerecorded message prior to completion of the message. Also, the emergency calling devices are generally manually reset to the beginning of a message after the called party has answered and are not automatically reset to the beginning of a message prior to the next call being instigated.
Typically, the prior art devices are capable of calling only a relatively small number of subscribers. At least one of the emergency numbers being called is certain to be responsive to the call, since the called emergency numbers are fire departments, police departments, etc. Thereby, it is feasible to utilize a preprogrammed device whereon there are stored all of the numbers to be called in sequence. In many instances if a relatively large number of subscribers are to be called in sequence, the cost of storing all of the numbers on a preprogrammed device, such as a magnetic tape, may be prohibitive.